Judge Dan Polster, on the same day, issued an order dismissing the lawsuit against John McDermott's brother and, at the same time, issued an order requiring John McDermott (who was not attorney of record for any parties in that case, was not admitted to practice law in the state of Ohio or in Judge Polster's court) to personally appear THE NEXT DAY to answer civil contempt charges as to why he should not be held in contempt for allegedly telling his brother not to appear at the case management conference (on the day when his brother's motion to dismiss was granted by the same judge and the case against the brother was dismissed).
There is no indication in the docket that John McDermott was served with the order to appear in civil contempt proceedings, or with the bench warrant.
John McDermott is, once again, practicing and living in New Jersey, and Judge Polster was summoning John McDermott to appear in Ohio the next day after the order to appear was issued, and without serving the order on John McDermott.
Actions of Judge Polster were clearly illegal.
Whenever people's liberty is involved, they have to be served with such warrants personally or at the very least by certified mail.
It takes time for orders to travel from state to state, so Judge McDermott definitely had no right to expect John McDermott to appear in federal court without ever having being served with the contempt charges in accordance to the law.
Moreover, the contempt charges were issued by Judge Polster, making Judge Polster an accuser against John McDermott.
On June 9, 2016 the U.S. Supreme Court made a decision in Williams v Pennsylvania, 579 U.S. __ (2016) holding, among other things, that when an accuser also acts as an adjudicator in the same court proceeding, such a situation constitutes a violation of the due process of the accused.
In other words, a judge cannot act as an accuser and prosecutor in the same court case.
Yet, that is exactly what Judge Polster is doing in his standoff against attorney John McDermott.
Judge Polster accused John McDermott of misconduct in a sua sponte order of June 7, 2016, before the decision in Williams v Pennsylvania was made, and, two days later, after the U.S. Supreme Court clearly ruled that behavior such as Judge Polster's in acting as an accuser, prosecutor and adjudicator in the same court case, is a violation of the accused's due process rights, Judge Polster adamantly continued, and still continues, to adjudicate the civil contempt case against attorney McDermott despite being the accuser in the same case.
Realizing that attorney John McDermott will not waive lack of jurisdiction over himself and will not appear in the illegal contempt proceedings, Judge Polster reportedly replaced his bench warrant with a $500/a day fine against attorney John McDermott.
Judge Polster's order imposing a fine upon John McDermott is dated June 15, 2016, nearly a week after the Williams v Pennsylvnia decision that indicated that not only an accuser cannot also be a judge in the same case, but the judge's failure to recuse from such a case is a violation of due process of law of the accused.
If Judge Polster wanted to act fairly with Attorney John McDermott, he should have acted as a complainant in the case, but should have recused from adjudicating the case.
Apparently, Judge Polster does not want to be fair, he wants to show to John McDermott and to everybody else that his power is unlimited, law or no law, and that he can do anything to people with impunity.
It is obviously personal to Judge Polster that he was disobeyed, no matter how unlawful, petty and unfair his infantile demands are which are based on unlawful knee-jerk orders that were filed, but not served upon the accused individual.
The media report about the ongoing standoff did not mention unlawfulness of Judge Polster's actions, their stark contradiction with the judge-established U.S. Supreme Court precedent.
Well.
In Alabama, the Chief Judge is now being investigated, and will possibly be removed because he disobeyed a U.S. Supreme Court precedent on gay marriage.
Here, a federal judge is acting as a petty tyrant and disobeys the U.S. Supreme Court precedent on point prohibiting an accuser in a court case to adjudicate that same court case.
I wonder whether any discipline will be imposed on Judge Polster based on his outrageous misconduct.
I will continue to follow this story and to cover it on this blog.
Stay tuned.
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